


Leitmotif

by bendingwind



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-15
Updated: 2011-07-15
Packaged: 2017-10-21 10:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/224176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bendingwind/pseuds/bendingwind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's a weapon with a perfect shot, but anytime she shoots to kill the Doctor, she misses and she isn't entirely sure why. Prompt by shadow243ali for the Guns & Curls ficathon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Leitmotif

Warm. Safe. Soft and… sweet. Sparkle. New!

…Hello.

Like! No. Yes. Hungry, Big Milk Thing? Okay. Mum. Big Milk Thing is Mum.

Who are you, Sparkle Thing? I’m (me).

* * *

Today, Melody wants to die. She sits curled in the corner of the room, wide-eyed and shaking, and nurses her broken arm.

[You’re lucky it was just an arm, girl, with the maneuver you just pulled. You’ll know to do better next time, won’t you, girl?]

The door to her room snicks shut with a metallic echo, and she closes her eyes and waits for her Golden Man to come to her. He does, apologizing as always that he can’t come for her, can only speak to her in her mind like this. She offers a trembling smile and tells him that it’s okay, because his thoughts are like golden sparkles of sunlight on the roof of the base, beautiful.

 _What’s wrong?_ he asks, and he sends tingles down her arm that make it so that it doesn’t hurt so much.

 _I’m okay,_ she says, even if it’s not quite true.

 _Not yet,_ he says, because he always knows when she’s lying, _but you will be, (you)._

 _You know my name,_ she says, because she’s said it before and he never answers, _the one I never tell anyone. How do you know my name?_

 _I’ll teach you someday,_ he answers, _when I find you, and then you will know my name as well._

She wakes up in the morning with her arm mostly healed, and she will face their pinches and shouts and sneers, she will let them teach her to shoot, maim, and kill, because one day they will take her to the stars and she can finally run away and find her Golden Man.

* * *

She strolls along the open deck of the ship, demurely looking away from the other passengers. One last test, before they take her to see the stars.

[Kill the Doctor, our greatest enemy.]

Well, that’s easy enough. She spots him, just ten feet away—hardly a challenge, tweedy and floppy-haired as he is. He’s kneeling to speak with a child, who looks suitably distressed for a passenger on the soon-to-embark Titanic. She pulls her gun from her bag, takes aim with practiced ease, and—

 _Hello, (you),_ the Golden Man brushes against her mind with a whisper. It’s been a year and her heart stops, not in time to stop her from pulling the trigger.

The bullet goes wide, lost to the cloudless sky, and the crowds cheer as the ship is loosed from its moorings. She searches frantically through the scattered faces for the one that will surely be looking for her, her Golden Man. When she catches herself and turns back to find the Doctor, he has disappeared. She stays for a day (to find the Doctor, she tells herself, but she knows it’s really to search for her Golden Man) and then they summon her back. Her first mission is a failure.

They take her to the stars anyway, for that is the place she is most likely to kill the Doctor.

* * *

If the Doctor is on Lebanon 9, he’s nowhere she can see him. She takes the time to sit in the cool damp nooks the natives use to meditate, and for the first time since she was a girl, she reaches out for her Golden Man.

 _Hello,_ he says, like a kiss to the forehead.

 _Hello,_ she replies, and she can feel him smile. _Are you here?_

 _I can always hear you,_ he says, and she sends a frown at the evasion. He laughs.

 _(you)._

 _What?_ she asks.

 _You’ll find him tomorrow,_ the Golden Man says, and she doesn’t have to ask to know who he’s referring to. _When you shoot, shoot to miss._

 _I never miss._

 _You have once before._

She does indeed find the Doctor the next day, this time sandy-haired and clad in vibrant green. She doesn’t shoot to miss, she tells herself, but somehow her shot is too low. The beating she gets when they come for her is worth the conversation with her Golden Man.

* * *

 _Who are you?_ she asks, perched on the windowsill of a tall building. The Doctor’s time machine sits solidly below her, awaiting his return.

 _You’ll find out soon,_ her Golden Man promises, and she believes him only because he has never lied before.

 _When?_ she asks, but he doesn’t answer. His consciousnesses trails along her cheek and tickles her collarbone and brushes her shoulder, and her eyelashes flutter closed at the sensation.

 _I have waited my entire life for you,_ she says.

 _No. You’ve searched for me your entire life._

 _I have. Why haven’t you searched for me?_ she asks, and she knows better now than to try and hide the tremor in her voice.

 _I have been searching, (you), for a very long time. You’ll understand one day._ When she reaches for him again, he has gone.

Her aim is off that day, and this time when she misses her shot, the Doctor looks up at her and smiles. The kindness in his eyes freezes her for a minute, until he looks away and locks the doors of his time machine behind him.

* * *

“That’s really rather poor sneaking on your part,” someone says from behind her, and she jerks around to face the Doctor with wide eyes. Her hand reaches for her gun, but he grabs her wrist—his skin is surprisingly cool.

 _I did ask you not to shoot me,_ her Golden Man says, sounding amused. Her eyes shoot up to the Doctor.

“You?” she asks, stepping back.

 _I promised to tell you how I knew your name, (you)_ he says, and when they run, she never looks back.


End file.
